Today, Me and Pea ventured over to Long Drove Dressage Centre, Huntingdon for a spot of dressage. I decided to enter us for both prelims as his canter is really starting to come along and so I felt he was ready for two prelims. However, when we turned up there wasn't much space to park and the warm-up arena was about 20x30m so I couldn't give him a canter beforehand as he's a bit funny about cantering with others around and definitely wouldn't manage in such a small arena so I made the decision to leave canter until the test and just see how he went rather than wind him up and me get flustered trying to canter in the warm-up arena.
He went quite nicely overall for this test. We've had issues warming up with picking up canter on the circle and this was half shown today. For his first canter he broke into trot a few times and was really unbalanced, but this was his first canter so it was to be expected, but when it came to the second canter I lengthened my reins a fraction as he works better with a slightly longer rein and he went really nicely. His trot work is really coming along nicely and he's coming a lot rounder, in fact in the warm-up arena for both tests he rode like a dream so I'm really excited about the rest of this year as I can't wait to see what it brings us. Overall we came 6th with 60.5% so I was really pleased and the judge's comments were: "Lots of potential but now needs to work more consistently into the contact to help transitions and balance and develop paces. Quietly ridden."
You can watch the test here.
Prelim 14:
After waiting around for an hour it was time for our second test. Again Pea warmed up really nicely and went straight into a contact which I was so shocked about! We went in and he went nicely with some nice movements. For the first canter, typical Pea form he decided to throw in some bucks - not on the agenda! However, he did keep moving forward and settled down again afterwards and his second canter went a lot nicer though he broke just before the trot so fell into trot a bit. His halt was really nice and he was obedient which makes a change as in practise we were practically at C before he decided to stop! Overall, despite the bucking I was really happy with him and got some nice comments from the judge: "Some very promising moments but he was rather naughty for you! Lots of potential but needs to be working more into the contact to start developing his work now. Well sat!" He scored 55.83%.
You can watch the test here.
Overall I'm really pleased with how today went considering the lack of warm-up and the long waits. He got some really nice comments from the judge, and she put some nice things about my riding which I really need to learn to accept! I'm hoping to take him to Crowland Show at the end of June for the dressage and depending if I can get the day off work maybe another before hand.
Thanks for reading,
Laura & Pea x
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